


Chess with Loki

by Weaselwoman



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Chess, Gen, Prisoner Loki, SHIELD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-30
Updated: 2014-05-23
Packaged: 2018-01-21 07:54:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1543301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Weaselwoman/pseuds/Weaselwoman
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Loki is a prisoner of SHIELD. Time for fun and games!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chess with Loki

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki is a prisoner of SHIELD. Time for fun and games!  
> [Reformatted]

**Classification: SECRET**

**S.H.I.E.L.D. Official Memo #17468**

From: Nicholas Fury, Director/Maria Hill

To: P. Coulson, J. Sitwell, N. Romanova, C. Barton, H. Pym, [others]

Cc: Loki NLN

Bcc: A. Stark

Re: Chess with the Prisoner Loki

**Background:**

As you know, the Prisoner Loki NLN (No Last Name, per his demand; hereafter referred to as “Loki”) has agreed to cooperate with our interrogations, provided they occur while the S.H.I.E.L.D. interrogator (hereafter “agent”) plays a game of strategy with him. As none of our agents know _hnefatafl_ , both sides have agreed to play chess. However, as we have found the official rules of chess (see S.H.I.E.L.D. Memo #112) to be insufficiently explicit for a player with “limited experience in the way Midgardian brains work” (that’s _his_ explanation, at any rate), we apparently need to list some of the _implicit_ rules of chess for the Prisoner’s benefit.

It is understood that many agents—especially those familiar with the game of chess—do not enjoy playing against the Prisoner Loki. However, the Psychology Department avers that it is learning a lot (and may apply these lessons in further personnel evaluation forms). Therefore, agents may not “beg off” when it is their turn to interrogate the Prisoner.

Upon request, therefore, here are clarifications required so far to the official rules of chess, to be used during S.H.I.E.L.D. interrogations of the Prisoner Loki. Updates to this list shall be published as needed.

**The Board:**

1\. You may neither add nor subtract squares from the chess board.  
1a. Or multiply, divide, exponentiate, or perform any other nontrivial mathematical operation.

2\. You may not change the color of any square on the chess board.  
2a. Especially to plaid.

3\. You may neither consolidate nor “subdivide” squares.

4\. Various squares do not “suddenly catch fire.”

5\. You may not freeze the board so that pieces are immobile.  
5a. You may not selectively freeze the other player’s pieces into immobility, either.

6\. No obstacles shall be placed upon the board to hinder piece motion.

7\. Food shall not be strewn across the board in such a way as to encourage wildlife (e.g., ants).  
7a. That ants are not playable pieces does not matter.

8\. Gravity shall be assumed to be constant across the entire board.

9\. Directions on the board do not change arbitrarily.  
9a. “Flipping of the Earth’s magnetic poles” will not affect chess play.

10\. The board is not a projection from “higher dimensional space” in a way that would affect moves.  
10a. Or adjacency of squares.  
10b. Said space is not “non-Euclidean.”  
10b1. Or eldritch.  
10c. In the absence of Tony Stark, chess may not be played using “Born-Von Karman Boundary Conditions.”

11\. Pieces only stand or move _atop_ the board, not underneath or through it.

**The pieces:**

1\. The white pieces are not ghosts, _draugr_ , or zombies.

2\. The black pieces are not “second class citizens.”  
2a. Also, black pieces are not _Svartaelfar_.

3\. Pieces do not combine into “Transformers.”

4\. Pieces do not “go walkabout.”

5\. Pieces do not cry.  
5a. Pieces do not feel emotion.  
5b. Or commit seppuku.

6\. Chess pieces are not subject to “berserk rages.”

7\. Pieces do not change color or role unless explicitly stated so by the actual (i.e., Memo #112), not supplemental, rules.

8\. Pieces do not “achieve enlightenment” and leave the board for Nirvana.  
8a. This is especially true for your opponent’s pieces.

9\. There are no “spy pieces” or “double agents.”

10\. There is no “Messiah” piece that, once captured, returns to the board after three moves.

11\. Pieces may not be dismembered in order to occupy more squares.

12\. You may not confer invulnerability to any piece.  
12a. Nor invisibility.  
12b. Nor duplicate copies, whether phantom or real.  
12c. Nor may you change the appearance of a piece to resemble another piece of different rank or color.

**Pawns**

1\. Pawn success is not determined through rap battles (even if you call it _flyting_ ).

2\. Pawns may not form “human pyramids.”

3\. Scrums of pawns are not allowed.

4\. Pawns do not smoke pot.  
4a. Even if this base is in Colorado.  
4a1. (Which it isn’t.)  
4b. The location of this base is to be kept from Prisoner Loki.

5\. Anarchist pawns do not throw "Molotov cocktails."

**Knights**

1\. Do not fondle the knights.

2\. The knights’ horses (or knights-as-horses) do not require food, water, or sleep; are genderless; and do not leave behind “road apples.”

3\. Knights may not independently take on quests (or side quests).

4\. A knight confronting a rook does not win via the “Trojan Horse maneuver.”

5\. You cannot capture pieces with a knight by calling it “Sleipnir” and jumping over opponent’s pieces checkers-style.

**Bishops**

1\. Bishops do not demand human sacrifice.

2\. Bishops are celibate.  
2a. Yes, really.

3\. The pope will not defrock the other side’s bishops.

4\. Bishops may not be used as rocket launchers.  
4a. The slit in the top of a conventional bishop piece indicates its mitre hat. It is not used to attach weapons or other equipment.

**Rooks (Castles)**

1\. Rooks are not bases for “mobile artillery platforms.”

2\. Castles do not combine into “apartment complexes.”  
2a. You may not charge (more) rent.  
2b. A castle in a corner is not “Boardwalk with a hotel.”  
2c. There are no “homeowner association fees.”

3\. Yes, rooks can move.

4\. Rooks do not “caw.”  
4a. Nor report to Odin.

**The Queen**

1.The Queen does not demand human sacrifice.

2\. Her virtue is irrelevant to the game.

3\. Queens do not sing “Bohemian Rhapsody,” either.

4\. The Queen is not an Iron Maiden.

5\. The Queen is not “Bugs Bunny in drag.”

6\. The promotion of a pawn to a queen does not create an “illegitimate polygamous state.”

**The King**

1\. The King is not disguised as “that pawn over there you overlooked.”

2\. You cannot give the role of the King to any other piece by playing “pass the crown.”

3\. Kings are not deposed through palace revolts by their own side.

4\. When the King and Queen are adjacent to each other, they are not entitled to a privacy curtain.

5\. The King and Queen are not “cross-dressing to confuse the others.”  
5a. Or “to find their true selves.”

**Play of the Game:**

1\. White goes first. Rather than the Prisoner guessing which of his opponent’s hands contain the white pawn,* the agent always goes first for the first game. Thereafter, sides alternate.  
1a. Yes, you have to take turns.

*with 100% success, so far

2\. Players alternate moves one at a time. This must be one complete move, not several “fractional moves.”  
2a. Again, yes, you have to take turns.

3\. All moves must be legal; that is, by the rules of the game of Chess.  
3a. Moves that are legal in other games or sports (so far including Monopoly, bowling, checkers, and POGs), but not legal in Chess, are not allowed.  
3b.Pieces do not teleport.

4\. Hypnotism is not allowed.

5\. Each piece occupies one and only one square.  
5a. Pieces may not share a square.  
5b. No piece can occupy more than one square. If it is placed on an edge (2 squares), or a corner (4 squares), it must be moved to the center of one square chosen by legitimate move.

6\. You cannot charge rent on squares, even if they are “your color.”

7\. You may not create duplicate pawns at will.  
7a. Or kings.  
7b. Or any other piece.  
7c. For either side.

8\. You may not add extra playing pieces of different shapes or sizes.  
8a. Especially dragons.  
8b. Or ants.

9\. Only one piece moves at a time, even if two are “good friends.”  
9a. (But see: Castle-ing).

10\. You may not “disappear” the other side’s pieces, secret-police style.  
10a. Or steal them off the board when your opponent is distracted.  
10b. Or otherwise remove them, save by legal capture.

11\. Captured Chess pieces are not hanged, drawn and quartered, or tortured in an Iron Maiden.

12\. It is called “ _capture en passant_ ,” not “capture a pissant.”  
12a. Again, no ants!

13\. Neither amnesty nor amnesia affect the pieces during the game.

14\. There are strict rules to prisoner exchanges.  
14a. Prisoners are not “brainwashed” or otherwise persuaded to change sides.

15\. “Knee to center of the board” is not a legal move.

16\. The following gambits are no longer allowed:  
16a. _The Sarajevo Incident_ ;  
16b. _Total Thermonuclear Annihilation_ ;  
16c. _That’s What She Told the Bishop_.

17\. You may not change the form of government of the chessmen on either side.  
17a. Or repeal standard chess rules (again, see Memo #112).  
17b. Or successfully appeal these rules.

18\. The game ends when one of the kings is taken, or put into Checkmate, or surrenders.  
18a. Moves and positions from one game do not carry over to future games.  
18b. Post-game celebrations are not part of the game, even if they allow the King to escape.  
18c. Kings do not gain “posthumous hero status” like that of El Cid. Over is over.

Finally, any “improvements” in the board, pieces, or play of the game instituted by Mr. Stark are only in effect while he is playing against the Prisoner Loki.

\--NF/MH

 

**Notes:**

S.H.I.E.L.D. Memo #112 was plagiarized from this: [http://www.fide.com/component/handbook/?id=124&view=article](http://www.fide.com/component/handbook/?id=124&view=article)

In Born-Von Karman boundary conditions, a piece may leave the left side of the board and re-enter on the right, and may leave on the top of the board and re-enter along the bottom. You see something similar in old video games like Asteroids. For an incomprehensible description involving electrons in reciprocal space, try <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Born%E2%80%93von_Karman_boundary_condition>. (Good luck!)

I refuse to believe that Sitwell is a HYDRA agent. His dialog with Coulson in _The Consultant_ was too cute. See: <http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2011118/quotes?ref_=tt_ql_3>. His patsy is legendary.


	2. Additional rules

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to my fans Alvitr and Donna for triggering these.

**Classification: SECRET**

**S.H.I.E.L.D. Official Memo #17508**

From: Nicholas Fury, Director/Maria Hill

To: P. Coulson, J. Sitwell, N. Romanova, C. Barton, H. Pym, [others]

Cc: Loki NLN

Bcc: A. Stark

Re: Chess with the Prisoner Loki

 

The previous additional chess rules for interrogation of the prisoner Loki (see **Official Memo #17468** ) having been found to be incomplete, the following additional rules shall apply:

1\. Kings do not go into convenient "Odinsleeps," regardless of circumstances.

2\. Once a piece is removed from the chessboard, it is out of play.  
2a. There are no "sniper pawns" that can attack pieces from outside the squares of the chessboard.

3\. Upon agreement of both players, captured pieces may be exchanged and returned to the chessboard.  
3a. This does not include kings.  
3b. Pieces must be exchanged for those of equal rank.  
3c. Pieces may not be exchanged for gold, or numbered Swiss bank accounts.  
3c1. Swiss banks do not recognize irrational or imaginary numbers for accounts.

4\. Kings are in place at the beginning of the game. There is no "regency period."

5\. Queens do not have poison apples, narcolepsy-inducing spindles, or gingerbread castles with ovens large enough to roast an unwary pawn.  
5a. Who gave Loki the book of fairy tales, anyway?

6\. Rooks do not walk on chicken feet. See 5a.

7\. When the opponent's piece blocks your on a straight-line path (for all pieces except knights), it must either stop before the opponent's piece, or take it. Your piece may not dodge it by going over, under, around, or through the opponent's piece.  
7a. Tony Stark shall have the option of calling "quantum tunneling rules" _only_ when he is playing.

8\. The queen may not move like a knight, even if she is named after Princess Anne of Britain, Britomart, or Catherine the Great of Russia.  
8a. No, she may not "combine" with a knight under "Catherine the Great-Count Orloff" rules.

9\. Knights do not need to announce their moves by shouting "Hi Ho, Silver! Away!"

10\. Remember that the purpose of these chess games is to interrogate the prisoner Loki. Therefore, the following requests are denied:  
10a. Speed chess;  
10b. Chess from a remote site;  
10c. The use of non-speaking mechanical proxy players.  
10c1. Especially DUM-E.  
10c1a. (Where _did_ it get the fire extinguisher full of whipped cream, anyway?)  
10c2. However, JARVIS is welcome to play chess with Loki. We request that Mr. Stark not attend if this match goes forward.

11\. Please limit explosions (or their equivalent) to a reasonable level. Do not crater chessboards unnecessarily. Rumor has it that Congress will be auditing our chessboard purchases, as certain senators think "chessboard" is a euphemism for something else.

12\. For sanitary reasons, as well as consideration of your opponent, please limit physical contact with the chess pieces to fingers and hands.  
12a. This includes _you_ , Mr. Stark.  
12b. In particular, do _not_ demonstrate the "Tijuana cigarette trick" with _any_ piece in front of the prisoner Loki.

13\. Pawns do not go "on strike" for better conditions or higher wages. There is no "Pawns and Minions Local #14."  
13a. Pawns are not entitled to put inflatable rats on the sidelines of the chessboard.

\--NF/MH


End file.
